Do drugs work?

[Sevlow]

I've always been put off taking any medication, mainly because (1) the potential side effects, (2) potential problems with withdrawal and addiction, (3) the idea of seeing if they work. The idea of entering a situation thinking the anxiety will be reduced and then finding out it hasn't - not a nice thought!! (4) i'm not really sure whether, in the long run, they would help. I need to learn to deal with my anxiety issues and if I take medication this would only mask things.

Do you feel that they have helped/not helped you?

No medication will cure Anxiety.Even my Psychiatrist just told me the meds were just an aid until therapy.I find they mask the problem,but they do give some relief to the syptoms.Sleeping pills work well for relaxation.Ambien and even natural meds like Valerian are supposed to work for Anxiety.Anti-Depressants did nothing for me.No harm in giving them a go.If they don't help ya,don't take them

[Gwen]

Was first prescriped anti-depressant peroxetine (brand name seroxat) whilst at Uni - after requested to be put on some meds - took it on an off for several years.

You have to come off it very gradually over several weeks reducing the dose or you get these unpleasant side effects. Also lots of recent controversy about this drug. I found whenever I forgot to take it for 1 or 2 days I got really bad side-effects; feeling light-headed, wierd electric-type sensation through by brain every so often - can't really describe it in words properly. Also Feeling nausous and generally strange.

For my recent bout of depression citalopram was recommended to me by my CBT therapist, so I had it prescribed for a few months earlier in the year. I found it alot better than peroxetine, with no noticable withdrawl side-effects.

On the whole I think drugs can help you get through a bad patch and take the edge off depression/anxiety so you can function more easily - and this is can be vital for helping you get better. But they are definitely not a solution. I took drugs on and off for years but without proper therapy to support it and I always lapsed back to my old habits. I may not have taken them as effectively as I could have of course, but it's only now that I've had a course of CBT therapy that I am beginning to actually properly change for the better.

Other medsI have been prescribed
diazepam - anti-anxiety drug, didn't get on to well with this one made me too sleepy to focus on the exams it was supposed to calm me down for. :rolleyes:

Sleeping tablets (can't remember name) - on occasion very helpful, ah a good night's sleep bliss!

[pboy]

I tried so many meds and none helped me.

Only Diazepam reduced my anxiety but its addictive.

[Gwen]

Yeah I never knew how effective they were being, I still felt depressed/anxious while on meds. Unless you could know how you would have felt at the same time without them, its really hard to know what effect they are having. Certainly for me they didn't completely erase the depression- I don't think such a wonder drug exists unfortunately - how much difference they did actually make to me I'm really not sure.

I guess the only way is to try for yourself, I recommend getting a good doctor/therapist to help you though.

[mico]

You've obviously given it some thought Sevlow and you've raised some valid questions.

Originally Posted by sevlow

I need to learn to deal with my anxiety issues and if I take medication this would only mask things.

I think that is the most important point to consider, and this is where I agree with Bak2Rehab.

Medications, in there usual sense only serve as a means of masking symptoms in which case they can create an opening to push ahead with your therapy a little.

However, I don't believe everyone needs this to push ahead with their progress, and even when people do it may not help. And then there is the withdrawel to go through, at which time you're anxiety is going to be heightened and you're practically starting from step one again.

Say, for example, if you're completely housebound and have been for a long time and you're really struggling to break that cycle, then medication may well help you to get back out of the house and on your feet a little. This is by no means a requirement though, but this is where it can aid your progress.

Each case should be judged on its own merits though and people take medications for various reasons. Some find they help, some don't. But you always have to remember that there will be a point when you want to leave the medication behind. The problem is, medication will never take you to that point, only the therapy used in conjunction with the medication will do that for you, and regardless of how effective your medication is, it will be hard work.

At the end of the day, the symptoms that are being masked by your medications need addressed if you want to make a full and complete recovery. It's entirely up to you, it may possibly help, but give it some good thought.

However, I've just written yet another long post on something I have no actual experience of myself.

Originally Posted by Bak2Rehab

No harm in giving them a go

The only point I disagree with, is this.

I may not have taken meds myself, but I have spoken to plenty of people over the years who have been going through hell trying to withdraw themselves from medication, or have even been going through hell making the transition going on to medication (it often gets worse before it gets better). And then there have been people who have only felt worse during the entire course of their medication, it seems that many people have to experiment with different drugs before they find one that suits them.



They may well make life easier for you, and who doesn't want that? But life by its very nature isn't easy. Often the things that you work hard for are the best things.


mico

[pboy]

I have to say, it was when I started to take Seroxat that my thinking got very ****ed up and after that the cycle seemed to carry on.

I do think it's good to take natural remdies though such as Valerian, St Johns Wort and so on.

[billy_brown]

ive been on the same anti depressant for 9 years. today it isnt working. im typing this at home over lunch, wondering whether to go back to work.

the thing with anti-depressants is that as much as they stop you feeling down, they also stop you feeling particularly up. i end up floating down this median strip of emotions; when i do feel happy, the feeling only goes so far. it feels like a temporary lobotomy, you dont feel sad, but dont feel to happy either.

when it comes to tackling social events, a big problem is that the anxiety robs the experience of any joy. the anti depressant hinders
things further, not letting you feel as 'up' as you might do when socialising goes well.

i really want to stop taking the things, but im terrified of just bottoming out. i can miss maybe 1 or 2 days of them, then its back down the black hole.

[Boc11]

Yes, if you imagine life as a rollercoaster with a series of peaks and troughs then antidepressants just seem to chop off the peaks and troughs although for me they just make me feel knackered all the time

[Sios]

Yes, if you imagine life as a rollercoaster with a series of peaks and troughs then antidepressants just seem to chop off the peaks and troughs although for me they just make me feel knackered all the time

I wonder why they would chop off the peaks though. I mean i thought these drugs generally just increased the level of Serotonin in the brain which makes you feel good.

Why would that make you feel kind of dulled of tired or something?

[mico]

As I've said before, I have no experience with these, but I have heard from some people that they can have a tendancy to numb all of your emotions.

I guess this heavilly depends on which ones though.


mico

[billy_brown]

it's hard to explain. with ssri anti depressants, which are the type im on, they work to keep serotonin from being reabsorbed in your brain, keep it doing its happy thing (im not a doctor. can you tell?).

but still they make me feel that the curtains are being kept drawn in my head. theres a lack of clarity, like being in a stuffy room.

[anne123456]

I had almost the opposite experience with an SSRI (prozac)-I rediscovered the highs and lows in life. Before that I was simply depressed-always low-ish, never emotional. With prozac, I was able to cry and be upset when something made me feel bad and could laugh and be truly happy when something made me feel good.

It didn't mask my SA really (but did relieve depression)-it made me much more interested in doing 'stuff' which made me more motivated to work through my SA. I took prozac for maybe 3 years over a 5 year period (ending around 3-4 years ago) and it changed my life.

Truth of the matter is that any given medication may or may not work for any one person. Unfortunately, no one can predict what effect it may have on you. None of them are miracle cures and I strongly believe that therapy is more necessary, but if you are truly depressed, I don't think therapy works as well.

I'm not a big fan of diazapam type drugs, as they do simply mask the symptoms of SA-and except for very occasional use can become 'the answer', but I understand why people use it.
Anne

[Sios]

I took prozac for maybe 3 years over a 5 year period (ending around 3-4 years ago) and it changed my life.

I'm glad they helped you Anne123456, its good to hear a positive result.

And did you find when you came off them that you tended to revert back to SA, or did the drugs help you to find a permanent improvement?

Also did you get tired while you were on them?

Thanks.

[Innerspace]

I've taken Cipralex since 2002 and echo pretty much all of anne123456's post.

This med virtually erradicated depression, and although i can still get really low at times this is more reactionary depression due to direct negative life experience rather than simply waking up depressed for no apparent reason like i used to.

I found a new motivation to work on my problems, and because the med's took care of the depression i found myself being able to concentrate on improving things. I don't feel numbed in general, although i am aware that my libido is now lower and i've virtually lost the ability to cry. I used to use crying as the natural release of pent-up emotion and pain that it is, so have no issue with crying, yet i rarely ever reach that point now. I've still felt incredible highs and lows though, so i'd not class myself as numbed.

Personally i believe that in order to work on SA effectively you have to tackle depression first, because in clinical depression you don't have the motivation to work at things which can help such as CBT or other forms of therapy. So here, SSRI's could well help, although they are by no means a cure.

With depression contained there can be more room and motivatiion to tackle therapy. In fact some studies show that medication alongside therapy is the most effective approach to tackle SA. Any decision is down to the individual and his/her doctors though.

In my own case at least, i can catagorically state that my med's have not masked my SA. I am still SA and feel SA, yet i feel far more able to work through it than i was pre-med's and therapy.
The post by Boc11 is a very accurate account of many people's experiences with SSRI's though. My counselling tutor actually used the same analogy herself when talking about life on medication, although in my experience i do still feel high's. I remember her saying how med's smoothed the edges ofo both the highs and the lows, just leaving a weird sort of in between state.

I don't know though. I've come on in leaps and bounds since going on meds and working simultaniously on my SA through therapy and modifying my attitudes. Maybe it depends on where you are in life when you consider your options. I was planning my suicide at the time so when i decided on one last try i was prepared to try anything. At that point going on med's seemed the least of my worries.

So for me, did they help? Yes. Are they a miracle cure? No way.
All the advice i have been given by my counsellors, my doctor and also what i've learned myself points to medication offering a helping hand whilst we do the real work ourselves. The best advice i was given was to make as much progress as possible when on the medication because it's these efforts that bring the long term changes which discourage us from sliding back into the ways that helped bring on depression etc in the first place.

The med's themselves? Well as has been said, they don't work for everyone. Many people have to try a number of them before they find one that suits them. Others never find one they feel ok on. This is the lottery with med's i suppose. If you find one that helps i suppose it is wise to see it as a stepping stone or helping hand rather than a cure-all, because that is something it is not.
Personally i'm so glad i went on Cipralex. I've not tried to come off it as yet because i'm not ready and my doctor agrees. Whatever happens though, the gains i've made through hard work and med's will stay with me forever, so i'm grateful for the help.

[willow]

Hi all,

Like Anne, I have had a good response to medication. I am currently on Prozac. I was prescribed a higher dose about 4 months ago and I have noticed a difference in myself. It has made life seem less of an uphill struggle all the time because you feel so low. I do believe my anxiety levels have reduced too and things don`t seem so daunting anymore or unbearable. I have been on and off anti-depressants for years. When I first went onto Prozac it was half the dose I am on now and I found it reduced my appetite and I lost weight (which wasn`t a bad thing really) and I sometimes felt slightly nauseous after taking it for a short while. I was later put onto different medication by my doctor as he didn`t think they were effective enough. In the end I resorted back to Prozac as I felt they were working as well as or better than the others with less side affects. The higher dose of 40mg instead of 20mg has made a difference and I am pleased with it at the moment. It`s suprising who depression can exasperate social anxiety. It has to be treated. I have had some therapy this year so maybe that has helped me more than I realise too. I`ve also been on an Anxiety Management course this year and are due to start a college course soon which for me is normally a very hard thing to do. However, I really want to do it and are quite looking forward to it. I know I have to do this for me as I think I isolate myself too much from people and yet I am a sociable person and need to be sociable and to have friends and I am denying myself that and it`s not right for me. I deserve more out of life and I need to feel that life is not just passing me by. My advice to people is to sort out the depression if you have it. It make take some time to find the right medication or therapy, but in the end you will find something that does help. I wish you luck.
Sammy xx

[anne123456]

Hi sios,
I had side effects the first 6 weeks or so, but not tiredness-I was very jumpy and had insomnia (this is apparently common with prozac, but not with seroxat). I was close to giving up the first time I took them as I felt worse at first, but I was pretty desperate at the point when I started on prozac (and suicidal). Gradually the side effects decreased to being non-existant after about 6 weeks and when the dosage was adjusted. After that, when I restarted, I knew that would happen and used valeria to keep calm and sleep the first month and then it was mostly okay, but still difficult.

My SA didn't revert when I went off prozac, mostly because I don't think it directly affected SA exactly. It lifted this dark cloud of depression and hopelessness that I felt and that allowed me to do the 'real' work to change how I was thinking. It also made me more confident about myself which let me test my boundaries. So, yes, it affected a permanant change in me. I asked my psychiatrist at the time-when I first started to improve on prozac-'does this mean I will have to take this forever or go backwards if I stop?' He said something that helped-'you might be teaching your brain how it feels to be not-depressed and more confident and that may stay with you' He was right

I don't know if I will again revert to depression/severe SA again, I might, but I hope I've learned enough that I would go back on prozac again.

Again I want to clarify, I'm not an advertisement for prozac or any other ssri, I think they are overprescribed, and what drug helps any one person at any one time in their life is a huge variable. I consider myself lucky.

Anne

[anne123456]

Originally Posted by willow

Hi all,

Like Anne, I have had a good response to medication. I am currently on Prozac. I was prescribed a higher dose about 4 months ago and I have noticed a difference in myself. It has made life seem less of an uphill struggle all the time because you feel so low. I do believe my anxiety levels have reduced too and things don`t seem so daunting anymore or unbearable. I have been on and off anti-depressants for years. When I first went onto Prozac it was half the dose I am on now and I found it reduced my appetite and I lost weight (which wasn`t a bad thing really) and I sometimes felt slightly nauseous after taking it for a short while. I was later put onto different medication by my doctor as he didn`t think they were effective enough. In the end I resorted back to Prozac as I felt they were working as well as or better than the others with less side affects. The higher dose of 40mg instead of 20mg has made a difference and I am pleased with it at the moment. It`s suprising who depression can exasperate social anxiety. It has to be treated. I have had some therapy this year so maybe that has helped me more than I realise too. I`ve also been on an Anxiety Management course this year and are due to start a college course soon which for me is normally a very hard thing to do. However, I really want to do it and are quite looking forward to it. I know I have to do this for me as I think I isolate myself too much from people and yet I am a sociable person and need to be sociable and to have friends and I am denying myself that and it`s not right for me. I deserve more out of life and I need to feel that life is not just passing me by. My advice to people is to sort out the depression if you have it. It make take some time to find the right medication or therapy, but in the end you will find something that does help. I wish you luck.
Sammy xx

Like you, I had to find the right dosage-on 20 mg/day, I had only a temporary effect. On 40mg/day, I couldn't sleep. 30 was perfect

[Innerspace]

cj0hn0 writes ...

"Well as far as I know its generally appreciated that drugs can work for a large number of people, although when you come off them you are more likely to relapse than if you have undertaken some form of therapy. Thats because drugs do not alter the underlying factors giving rise to our difficutlies, they merely mask them".


I agree with almost all of that. The only bit i don't agree with in my own experience is that the med's mask things. To me they are always still there, but i just cope better with them.

Something i remember both my doctor and counsellor at the time saying was that may people get disillusioned with medications and say they 'stopped working' after a period of time.
They put this down to the fact that these people simply relied on the meds to do all the changing for them, and after the initial period of improvement once the med's had settled into the system these people did nothing to actually tackle the root causes of their problems through therapy or even just their own actions, so in effect nothing actually really changed.

So of course what you say is right. The drugs may well lessen depression on their own, but they do nothing to alter the perceptions and distorted thinking that leads a person to develop SA in the first place. Those things are best dealt with in therapy.
Change those things and the chances of a return to SA are significantly reduced. As my GP/counsellor pointed out ... it's what you do whilst on medication which creates lasting change, not the medication itself.

[diplodocus]

I find this subject fascinating. I have never seriously considered medication due in part to my own many years of experimental recreational drug use but also because of the effects as I have seen it in others.

The numbing effect that several people have mentioned is what worries me. I feel like that naturally anyway. Maybe its a protective mechanism that I've developed, I don't know but I certainly don't want to exacerbate that effect.

Two members of my family on the in-law side suffer from manic depression and have been on various anti-depressives for 20 years or so. They were both very outgoing sociable people before the onset of their mental illness. The medication they are on produced the lobotomised state that they currently are in. To me they are shells of their former selves and it saddens me to see it. However it is obviously preferable to the deep depression and subsequent manic delusions they suffer from if they weren't on the medication. It always reminds me of One Flew Over The Cuckoos Nest. Mentally it has slowed them down considerably, and their speech reminds me of a punch drunk boxer. This scares me and for that reason I'd never consider taking any of these drugs. As well as the problem of coming off them, which has more to do with my own previous drug problems. I understand that people respond to various drugs in a multitude of ways but I guess I don't feel they are for me.

[anne123456]

Originally Posted by cj0hn0

Well as far as I know its generally appreciated that drugs can work for a large number of people, although when you come off them you are more likely to relapse than if you have undertaken some form of therapy.

I agree, therapy is the first and foremost need-but people in a deep depression may need drugs to even get to that point.

[ozy123]

Well I think it depends on the drugs involved. There are some drugs that cause drowsiness/numbing but then there are those that don't. There are also those that increase anxiety (whilst treating depression). The ones typically prescribed for depression increase serotonin levels which in turn alters human thoughts/behaviour. Ie if your depressed you are very likely to have low levels of serotonin and medication can help normalize those levels so you return to thinking as normal and not in a depressed state of mind.

For medications for depression what I got out of the literature is that when you are depressed your behaviour/thoughts are also depressed accordingly (the symptoms of depression), the levels of serotonin in your blood are also very low. Increasing those levels is likely to get your thinking and behaviour back to normal. This usually works in mild/moderate depressions. The thought processes that you have (usually your core beliefs) will not be permanently altered. Its a way of getting you back up on your feet. I think most professionals recommend a combination of therapy/pills but it has also been shown for a great number of depressions medication alone can help them overcome it. For others it takes more. You just need to find out what you need.

(the symptoms of depression), the levels of serotonin in your blood are also very low. Increasing those levels is likely to get your thinking and behaviour back to normal

Well,It's all good in theory,but Psychiatry still has a lot to learn.In my opinion is a weak medical speciality.Raising seretonin won't necessarily cure depression and not all depressed people have low levels.
Some people given Anti-depressants have had adverse effects and increased suicidal tendancies and patients given Anti-Psychotics long term have suffered irreversable brain damage.They don't know how the brain functions 100% and everyones is different.They are yet to prove that any "mind disorder" is really medically related.At the moment their patients are being tested out like Rats when they invent a new drug

[Sevlow]

Thanks for the replies Some interesting points.


For me, depression isn't really an issue. I do have mild depression. I believe this is caused by my SA and life situation and as that improves, so will any depression issues. My problem is about the physical anxiety symptoms. Drugs may help reduce these, but as I said before, maybe I need to learn to deal with these rather than reduce them through drugs. Hey, there's always booze!!!!!

When I spoke to my doctor a few years ago, they told me they weren't the type of practice which just prescribed drugs (which I was quite happy about), but they didn't really help me and just gave me a leaflet on social anxiety!!

I also tried hypnotherapy, and after a few sessions, they told me I was cured!! Well, I went into an potential anxious situation and it was as strong as ever!!!! Hynotherapy doesn't work

[cloudyg]

Im too scared to take any drugs for my anxiety since it was drugs that caused it in the first place.